possesses the attribute of courage; in the case, for instance, of the dog braving the tiger (Watson). In age and disease, mental and bodily, there is frequently a loss of the usual power of measuring distance or height, or of estimating an animal's own strength, or other ability, physical or mental: the consequence of which is self-injury in various forms and to various degrees. CHAPTER XXIX. COURTSHIP AND MARRIAGE. THERE is a striking resemblance between courtship and marriage in the lower animals and in man; almost every phenomenon in the latter has its exact counterpart in the former. Mating or pairing in other animals, and the preliminary operations-including the peculiarities of what is variously spoken of as the 'season of love,' or the breeding season-furnish illustrations of the most important kind of certain of the mental and moral qualities of the lower animals. These features in their mental or moral character include more especially 1. Preference or choice in the selection of mates by the nubile females. This, again, involves a. Deliberation-the consideration of the qualifications of candidates. b. Testing comparative qualifications by a sort of competitive examination; sometimes c. Decision; or, on the other hand d. Indecision, vacillation, or hesitancy-not knowing her own mind-in the female. e. Change of mind or fickleness. f. Caprice or whimsicalness. g. The development of singular, perhaps unaccountable, likes and dislikes. h. Fastidiousness. 2. The paying and accepting or refusal of addresses or attentions by and from the male. 3. The deliberate display to the greatest advantage of personal charms by the male, which involves on his part a. The study of effect. b. Intention, with a definite end in view. c. Effort to please including gallantry. 1. Beauty of form, colour, or song— 2. Physical strength and courage. e. Rivalry or competition, with its attendant passions-jealousy, anger, pugnacity, and their results. f. The eagerness or ardour of sexual love, which is apt to become excessive or morbid. g. The exhibition of antics and foolery of various kinds. h. Love of admiration and approbation-including vanity and dandyism. i. The estimation or calculation of advantages. On the part of the female: j. Appreciation of : 1. Physical and mental excellence; and of 2. The desire to please. And on the part of both sexes coquetry. 4. The holding of ceremonies and assemblies-involving fixation of time and place. 5. The modes of expressing affection or endearment— especially by mutual embrace or kissing. 6. The dominance of a master passion and its results-including infatuation or fascination, as well as other changes. of character or disposition, temporary or permanent. 7. Constancy and inconstancy in love and the conjugal relationship-including the formation, keeping, and rupture of engagements, profligacy, prostitution, seduction and desertion. 8. Conjugal happiness and unhappiness, with their causes. 9. Occasional assumption by the female of male prerogatives. The most noteworthy point in connection with the mating or pairing of the lower animals is the choice of a mate so frequently made--for instance, among birds-by the female. This choice is determined in some cases, just as in woman, by caprice; it is impossible to give any rational explanation of the preference made. But in a much larger proportion of cases than in woman the selection made is, or appears to be, determined by reasons that are not only intelligible but commendable. These reasons include, for instance 1. The personal beauty of the male-the gorgeousness of his plumage more especially. 2. The charms of his song. 3. His physical strength and, associated with it, his courage, his ability to protect and provide for his mate. 4. Other physical characters-such as size, form, and colour peculiarities. 5. His sagacity and experience, or other mental or moral qualities or acquisitions. The female frequently exercises the utmost deliberation— involving perhaps caution-in her choice of a mate. She reviews the personal advantages of her male suitors. The female bird obviously looks, in the first place, for a congenial helpmate and protector-a male whom she can at once admire, trust, and respect; and it were well if womankind were always as judicious in their principle of selection, where any principle is at all adopted. No doubt in certain cases and senses the choice of the female animal may be said to be determined by a consideration for her personal comfort or interest in other words, by selfishness. Nevertheless, whether or not the principle of selection be considered a selfish one, its beneficence cannot be doubted: the results of such selections are, on the whole, good. It may happen, however, as in woman, that the excellences, whether mental or physical, which the female animal sees in her suitor, are apparent rather than real; that she deceives herself, and perhaps, like her human sisters, marries in haste and repents at leisure.' This is only tantamount, however, to saying that the frequent and serious errors of animals, as of man, extend to matters amatory and matrimonial. The preferences displayed in courtship are more frequently or more generally exhibited by the female than the male animal (Darwin). The common cock, however, chooses young hens; he shows the same sort of natural preference that man so usually does for fresh, youthful attractions. On the other hand, the partiality of the cock pheasant is for old hens (Darwin); so that in the amatory and matrimonial affairs of other animals, as in those of man, most fortunately no doubt, de gustibus nil disputandum. But deliberate choice or selection is by no means confined to love affairs. It is constantly shown, and in a great variety of ways, by the lower animals-quite as much at least by the males as the females. Thus it is shown in the following important particulars : 1. The preference of duty to revenge, to pleasure, to personal ease or gratification-in other words, of the right to the wrong; or, on the contrary of— 2. The expedient or politic-whether or not it is also wrong to the right; of selfish considerations to self-sacrificing benevolence. 3. Preference of immediate and certain death by suicide to the probability of prolonged life and torture; or of death to the desertion of their young by mothers; or in many other cases 4. Choice of the lesser of two evils or dangers. 5. Partiality for human society-shown by so many birds and other animals. 6. Likings or dislikes for or to particular animals, persons, places, things, sounds, and colours-including favouritism as to companions or playfellows, masters or mistresses, nesting or building places, and the materials of construction; especially the 7. Predilections shown by so many animals for particular foods or articles thereof-for instance, for those used by man, including cooked foods and intoxicating beverages. 8. Preference of liberty or freedom to captivity or confinement; but, on the other hand, a singular deliberate 9. Selection of captivity and its advantages in preference to a wild life with its risks. |